This might not mean much to a lot of people, but one of the most famous professional wrestlers of all time, Mark Calaway – better known as The Undertaker – retired earlier this week. With Wrestlemania 35 only weeks away, and with a name like The Undertaker, you’d think he would be the last person to let you down. Of course, his retirement might be a gimmick because, of all the sports, pro wrestling is the fake one. I know the AFL looks rigged at times and so does the rugby league – even the cricket sometimes looks crooked … Maybe I should leave cricket out of these musings. I can still remember as a child, before WrestleMania II (yes, I’m feeling very old as I write this) that even though King Kong Bundy was more experienced in cage fighting and held the world record for the fastest win (eight seconds), Hulk Hogan was going to win. No wonder I’m always forgetting important things when I’ve still got all this drivel swirling around in my brain. Of course, I was pretty anti-wrestling once I found out it was all fake news and that I’d been lied to. In a way, I guess that’s how people feel after they’ve lost their faith in religion. Comedian Jimmy Carr may very well be telling some of the most offensive jokes you will find on YouTube these days. So it’s surprising that when he lost his Catholic faith at age 26, he fell so deeply into crisis that he sought psychotherapy to help him cope with his loss of faith. Whenever I meet someone who is very anti-religious, it is almost always the case that they once were religious. I guess these days I look at professional wrestlers as a bunch of crooks running around with no pants on, fighting for belts. Yet these wrestlers are providing many metaphors for life. I think everybody wrestles, the only question is where. Wrestling is unavoidable. Some people wrestle with their conscience. And while that is a good start, if the wrestle never advances from there, then it is not good for our spiritual or mental health. The wrestle has to lead to action or even just a decision about how you are going to think about your problem from now on. Think of when you’ve had an exam to study for or a job to do. You wrestled with it in your mind, and it hurt your head. However, once you wrestled with it in the real world – that is, you actually started to study or research – you found that the wrestle was not so bad. It’s the wrestles in our mind that wear us down and do us the most damage. In pro wrestling there are moves like the suplex or half-nelson, or even the aerial moves in which wrestlers jump off the ring’s cornerposts onto other wrestlers. These moves look almost fatal, but they’re all fake and rarely are fighters actually hurt. You might say “I’ve been wrestling with this problem for months/years!” Well, yes, in your mind. But if you were to wrestle this problem on the field, at your desk, in your work shed, on your knees, at the gym, you will find that the actual wrestle is easier than the mental wrestle and will ease the mental and emotional pain. In the Bible, Jacob meets the angel of God and asks the angel for a blessing. The angel ignores this request. Now, usually in the Bible what the angel of the Lord says, goes. However, Jacob tackles the angel and wrestles with it all night. Was Jacob punished for ankle tapping an angel? No. Jacob was blessed for his efforts and this is how Jacob became Israel. I take from this that it is better to wrestle with God than to ignore God. It is better to wrestle with your problems physically than to merely wrestle with them mentally. Like the professional wrestlers, you don’t even have to win – you just have to get in the ring. Twitter: @fatherbrendanelee

Forget all the mental wrestling - join the fight

This might not mean much to a lot of people, but one of the most famous professional wrestlers of all time, Mark Calaway – better known as The Undertaker – retired earlier this week.

With Wrestlemania 35 only weeks away, and with a name like The Undertaker, you’d think he would be the last person to let you down.

Of course, his retirement might be a gimmick because, of all the sports, pro wrestling is the fake one.

I know the AFL looks rigged at times and so does the rugby league – even the cricket sometimes looks crooked …

Maybe I should leave cricket out of these musings.

I can still remember as a child, before WrestleMania II (yes, I’m feeling very old as I write this) that even though King Kong Bundy was more experienced in cage fighting and held the world record for the fastest win (eight seconds), Hulk Hogan was going to win.

No wonder I’m always forgetting important things when I’ve still got all this drivel swirling around in my brain.

Of course, I was pretty anti-wrestling once I found out it was all fake news and that I’d been lied to.

In a way, I guess that’s how people feel after they’ve lost their faith in religion.

Comedian Jimmy Carr may very well be telling some of the most offensive jokes you will find on YouTube these days.

So it’s surprising that when he lost his Catholic faith at age 26, he fell so deeply into crisis that he sought psychotherapy to help him cope with his loss of faith.

Whenever I meet someone who is very anti-religious, it is almost always the case that they once were religious.

I guess these days I look at professional wrestlers as a bunch of crooks running around with no pants on, fighting for belts.

Yet these wrestlers are providing many metaphors for life.

I think everybody wrestles, the only question is where.

Wrestling is unavoidable. Some people wrestle with their conscience. And while that is a good start, if the wrestle never advances from there, then it is not good for our spiritual or mental health.

These wrestlers are providing many metaphors for life. I think everybody wrestles, the only question is where. Wrestling is unavoidable. Some people wrestle with their conscience. And while that is a good start, if the wrestle never advances from there, then it is not good for our spiritual or mental health.

The wrestle has to lead to action or even just a decision about how you are going to think about your problem from now on.

Think of when you’ve had an exam to study for or a job to do.

You wrestled with it in your mind, and it hurt your head.

However, once you wrestled with it in the real world – that is, you actually started to study or research – you found that the wrestle was not so bad.

It’s the wrestles in our mind that wear us down and do us the most damage.

In pro wrestling there are moves like the suplex or half-nelson, or even the aerial moves in which wrestlers jump off the ring’s cornerposts onto other wrestlers.

These moves look almost fatal, but they’re all fake and rarely are fighters actually hurt.

You might say “I’ve been wrestling with this problem for months/years!”

Well, yes, in your mind. But if you were to wrestle this problem on the field, at your desk, in your work shed, on your knees, at the gym, you will find that the actual wrestle is easier than the mental wrestle and will ease the mental and emotional pain.

In the Bible, Jacob meets the angel of God and asks the angel for a blessing. The angel ignores this request.

Now, usually in the Bible what the angel of the Lord says, goes.

However, Jacob tackles the angel and wrestles with it all night.

Was Jacob punished for ankle tapping an angel? No. Jacob was blessed for his efforts and this is how Jacob became Israel.

I take from this that it is better to wrestle with God than to ignore God.

It is better to wrestle with your problems physically than to merely wrestle with them mentally. Like the professional wrestlers, you don’t even have to win – you just have to get in the ring.